Catch Up

In order to prevent killing each other in this teeny condo, the girls and I have been trying to knock out all that Seattle has to offer. The first Thursday of every month, Seattle offers free entrance to a lot of their museums. Since last Thursday was the big day, the girls and I went to MOHAI (Museum of History and Industry). There, they learned all about catching and canning salmon:

We saw the "glue pot" that is believed to have started the fire that burned nearly all of Seattle to the ground in 1889.

And Mr. Ibsen gave me a great idea of what I can do with all the girls' old Keds:

While the museum was interesting, if you are planning a trip to Seattle, I don't think I would put MOHAI at the TOP of your list for sites to see. What I would highly recommend, however, is a picnic at the Washington Arboretum, just outside of MOHAI.

While we ate, we were visited by some feathered friends.

And then we did the half mile (or so) walk through the water that is part of the Arboretum. Trees bowed to make an arched path,

And sites different from ones we are used to, delighted us all.




We saw why the Seahawks think they have a leg up on our tailgating. I still think half the fun is walking from one one tailgate to the another and sampling everybody's food. That would be hard to do by boat.

At the other end of the Arboretum, the girls took a lot of joy from feeding the ducks their left-over grapes. We did bite them in half...and I wasn't sure if grapes were really safe for ducks...but we didn't see any signs of choking.


On Friday, we met some blog friends at the zoo! Where I managed to find a new giraffe friend to replace my baby in Birmingham:


And some people friends! This is Andrea and Madeline:

Andrea is from Trussville, AL (just outside of Birmingham), went to Auburn, has been living in Denver for the past several years and just happened to be in Seattle this summer because of her husband's job. When she saw we were moving here, she kindly offered to be a little Southern comfort to us, and we were all very thankful.

It was probably the coldest and wettest day we had had in Seattle so far. So we didn't see a whole lot of animals, but we did have a lot of fun at the indoor play area. Mary Aplin and Madeline got to run off some energy:

And can you tell how much fun Pace had learning about the animals from this young zoo worker?

Pace planted herself in that seat and didn't get up for about 45 minutes, just soaked it all up! Mary Aplin stopped by to see what all the fuss was about...

...but quickly got distracted by the elephant behind her :) A little more along the lines of her idea of fun.

I think that Madeline was trying to figure out what kind of species we all were.

Thanks Andrea and Madeline! We had a lot of fun with y'all!

I didn't have my camera with me for the weekend, but we took the girls for a hike on Big Tree Loop at Tiger Mountain Saturday afternoon and then that night...JEREMIAH AND I WENT ON A DATE!! I have managed to make a Seattle friend (who I want to tell you more about later) and she offered a babysitter name so that Boots' dad didn't have to do it :) Thank you all for the kind babysitter suggestions from the last post. The one we used this weekend is about to get married, so I will definitely be taking you up on your ideas!

I wish so badly I hadn't forgotten my camera on date night. Jeremiah looked really handsome in a coat his Mom gave him for graduation. We went to Palace Kitchen, and if you come for a visit you must go, and if the blackberry cobbler and coconut cream pie are on the menu YOU NEED BOTH!

On Sunday, we went for a run at Greenlake, bought fresh produce/had lunch with our new friends at the Capitol Hill Farmer's Market, and then found our church home on Sunday. I really think we found it...more later! Hard to know how our Sunday night was so bad after such an awesome weekend...huh? I thought so.